OVERTONES 

Jessie Wiseman Gibbs 







Class __/^_2 
Book . ZLT. 



GopiglitN^__/^ 




COPYRIGHT DEPOSITS 



©vertones 



A BOOK OF VERSE 



BY 

JESSIE WISEMAN GIBBS 




BOSTON 

SHERMAN, FRENCH & COMPANY 

1913 



01 



COPYBIGHT, 1913 
ShZEDIAN, FeENCH &* COMPAKY 



©CI,A358645 



TO 
MY HONORED FRIEND AND TEACHER 

DR. OREN BRADSHAW WAITE 

IN MEMORY OF 

CLASSROOM DAYS 

WHEN HE UNVEILED FOR US 

THE GLORY OF GOD 

IN THE FACE OF JESUS CHRIST 



The author acknowledges with 
thanks permission to reprint by 
the following periodicals: Poet- 
Lore, The Continent, The North- 
western Christian Advocate, The 
Central Christian Advocate, The 
Home Herald, and other magazines. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

O Word 1 

The Poet's Prayer S 

God's Wonders 5 

A Prairie Rose 7 

A Country Ramble 8 

The Winds and the Storms of Jehovah . 10 

Nature and Prayer 14 

To a Caged Bird 16 

To a Wren 19 

Neighbor Oriole 20 

Three Windows 22 

Modern Mother 23 

The Child and I 25 

Spirit of Christmas 26 

Thorns 28 

A Toast 29 

What Courage? 30 

Thanksgiving, 1898 31 

Dead! 32 

The Yellow Curse 34 

Our Peace 36 

My Country's King 37 

Of Such Is the Kingdom 38 

Teach Us to Pray 41 

Morning Collect 42 

Morning Prayer 43 

Assurance 44 

Satisfaction 45 

The Heart of Stone 46 

New Life 48 

Cry of the Spirit 50 

A Psalm of the Spirit 51 



PAGE 

The Sword of the Spirit 52 

Revelation 53 

Unchanged 54 

The Present Need 55 

Son of Man 56 

Peace, Be Still! 57 

Stanzas for a Hospital 58 

The Riddle of the Nazarene .... 59 

My Witness 60 

Jesus, I Come to Thee 63 

Friend of Sinners 64 

Confession 65 

Strength in Weakness 67 

Out of the Depths 68 

Morning Watch 69 

Noonday Prayer 70 

Evening Prayer 71 

To A Young Convert 73 

I Would You Knew My Master .... 74 

A Thorny Way 75 

Calvary's Hill 76 

Christ and the Proud Soul 78 

To AN Early Spring Blossom .... 82 

The Unseen King 84 

The King of Glory 85 

Our Captain King 86 

King of Men 88 

Across the Prairie 89 

In the Town 90 

One in Christ 91 

Blind of Spirit 93 

Loaves and Fishes 94 

Inscription for a Church Door ... 96 



PAGE 

A Song of God's House 97 

A Prayer of This Age 98 

Evensong 99 

That They May Be One 100 

Is God the God of the World? .... 102 

Pray Ye Therefore 103 

The Present Crisis 104 

Whose Son Is He? 105 

Easter Meditation 113 

SONNETS 

"In the Days of Thy Youth" .... 125 

In the Deluge 126 

The Cloud 127 

After Doubt of Immortality .... 128 

On Losing Faith in God 129 

On Doubting the Divinity of Christ . .130 

The Sermon 131 

The Blind Man 132 

Atonement 133 

Inevitable 134 

The Pivot of the World 135 

Bereavement 136 

"Whose Loves in Higher Love Endure" . 137 

Cupid and Christ 138 

O Barren Earth! 139 

Signs of the Times 140 

Our Star 141 

America and the Hague 142 

The World's Star 143 



O WORD! 

WORD that dost elude my pen, my lips, my 
brain. 

Word that my straining spirit swoons inly to 
attain, 

Word to which all the words of men are impo- 
tent and vain — 

Pure flower of words, white star of thought, 
somewhere divinely plain! 

Thou movest in the millions, to do they dream 
not what ; 

Thou thrillest senseless matter, and yet we 
catch thee not ; 

Thou calledst me to being, and yet I have for- 
got ;— 

word ineff'able, of God's own lips alone begot ! 

1 shall not win the thought I crave, nor speak, 

nor show: 

So seems it to my yearning; and yet not 
wholly so, 

Since all the bliss of Heaven is measured by 
the woe 

We spend in striving for its light, and wres- 
tling, here below. 



[1] 



My brain must sweat, my pen must toil, my lips 

must pray. 
Till some that have not thought nor sought 

shall pause and say, 
"What means the song? How sweet it were if 

this dull clay 
Could know the thing that it would sing and 

melt in bliss away !" 

So let me sing, although my song soar never 

near 
The word itself, but only chant, "How sweet it 

were to hear!" 
Let my soul's anguish bear me on, till the black 

gates appear 
Through which the immortal Word of Life shall 

greet me, full and clear ! 



[2] 



THE POET'S PRAYER 

Through the thick atmosphere of years 

When every mountain high 
And every grove its heathen altar bears, 

And righteous rulers die,* 

Comes to the yearning poet's sight 

The prophet vision old 
Of the unseen — unfettered floods of light — 

With voices manifold. 

And as he strains to hold it fast, 

It quivers into wings ; 
And as his whole soul listens, clear at last, 

With one acclaim it sings, 

"0 holy, holy, all Heaven bows ! 

The Lord of Hosts is He! 
The whole earth with his glory overflows, 

Who was, and is to be!" 

And lifting high his sight to where 

The seraphs start the word. 
Upon a throne, unutterably fair. 

The poet sees the Lord. 

* 1901. 



[3] 



Then anguish strikes the poet, "Woe 

Is me, I am a man 
Of unclean lips, and all my people go 

In sin, since time began ! 

"How shall I live? O vain to speak! 

My own false Sibboleth 
Betrays me from the kindred of the weak 

And dooms me to my death ! 

"O living Fount of Being, Thou 

Whose heart alone is pure. 
Send down thy seraph with his live coal now 

To work his burning cure! 

"Purge out the dross and stain of earth ; 

Thy light in me unroll, 
Until I know my own eternal worth — 

A liberated soul ! 

"Till I no longer feel the doubt 

Of them that know Thee not. 
But hold thy truth within and speak it out, 

All fear of men forgot ! 

"Till never veil shall flutter more 

Between my word and me. 
But all my breath in utterance outpour 

The things I hear and see !" 

[4] 



GOD'S WONDERS 

God laid not all his wonders bare 

Before the eyes of men, 
But some He hung in spaces rare 

Beyond their fancy's ken. 

And some He sifted through the air, 

Too fine to be discerned, 
And some He dropt in ocean, where 

Unquenchably they burned. 

And some He hid in caves of earth, 

And some within the forms 
That come and go in death and birth, 

And some He masked in storms. 

And when man thought he knew her face, 

He bent his back to dig 
Into the great earth's secret place. 

With gold and jewels big. 

And not content with depths of clay. 

He dived beneath the sea — 
Beheld through dimly filtered ray 

New realms of mystery; 



[5] 



And made him eyes of glass to watch 
The dusts that air immerse, 

And other eyes of glass to catch 
Dusts of the universe. 

And thus from age to age he finds 

God working everywhere, 
And each new miracle reminds 

Him of his infant prayer. 



[6] 



A PRAIRIE ROSE 

I WILL not call thee rose, 

For thou art not a thing — 

The flame that on me glows 
Is but thine earthward wing. 

Thou art a thought of God, 
His loving thought for me, 

Breathed through my native clod 
Where I can feel and see. 

"Heaven is not hid above: 
Fear not, O child of care, 

I am thy Father, and my love 
Is round thee, like the air." 

Someone will pluck the rose, 
But it will fade and die; 

God's thought within me grows 
And blooms eternally. 



[7] 



A COUNTRY RAMBLE 

My long trudge through the heat 
Has made the scene more sweet. 
The railroad track behind, 
I wander with the wind 
Beneath a prairie sky 
Wide as the All-seeing Eye, 
Filled with such melting hues 
As might themselves diffuse 
About the unblinded sight 
Of Him whose life is light. 

O deep and silent sky. 

Deep as infinity. 

Calm as eternity — 

What native majesty 

Glows in thine outstretched wings 

That brood o'er man and things 

With tender, yearning love. 

Yet stoop not from above! 

The showers have left the grasses meet 

To bear unsoiled a fairy's shining feet. 

O never have I seen so subtle green 

(That might be light, but for its deeper sheen) 

As threads the brookside now; 

Nor witnessed water flow 

With such transparent bliss 

[8] 



Through light and shade, as this. 
Pure little streamlet, tell 
Me from what hidden well 
Thou pourest forth thy heart, 
That I may seek thine art! 

Those clouds of willows seem 
To hang above the stream, 
As though their splendor grew 
But from the upper view 
Of its sweet purity; 
All mystical they lie 
Upon its waving breast, 
Living, yet lulled to rest. 

How is't I love thee so, 

But that thou art for me 

And I akin to thee? 

Dear Nature let us grow! 

This is God's world, 

God's love unfurled. 

And nothing is forlorn ; 

In Nature's arms faith cannot die 

God's world is good, and so am I, 

'Tis well that I was born ! 



[9] 



THE WINDS AND THE STORMS OF 
JEHOVAH 

The winds and the storms of Jehovah 
Swept over the mountain in wrath; 

The forest of beauty majestic 

Lay straight in their terrible path. 

The towering trees of the forest 

Flung up their great arms side by side, 

"Thy winds and thy storms, O Jehovah, 

Withhold them, withhold them!" they cried. 

"Lo, here on this altar eternal 

We serve Thee by day and by night; 

We leap into life at thy bidding; 
We mount into joy in thy sight. 

"0 spare us to worship before Thee! 

Turn back thy fierce weapons in haste, 
Ere the life and the love of thy creatures 

Lie dead in a desolate waste!" 

The winds and the storms of Jehovah 

Sped steadily on to the wood ; 
They struck it with crashing of thunder 

That shook all the ground where it stood. 



[10] 



They struck it with flashing of lightning 
More bright than the middle of day, 

That printed its writhing contortions 
On darkness, then vanished away. 

With sobs as of giants in anguish 

The forest resounded with woe ; 
With crackling of bones that were broken 

The valley re-echoed below. 

In pain and in terror and passion 

The trees wrestled all through the night 

With the winds and the storms of Jehovah — 
Jehovah, who guarded his height. 

But after the struggle, in blessing. 

Great tears dropt the storm o'er the wood, 

And it lifted itself at the dawning 
In chastened and penitent mood. 

More patient and still for its weakness, 
More tender and pure for its tears, 

It bowed in the grace of submission, 
"Forgive, O Jehovah, our fears." 

Then bright shone the sun o'er the mountain ; 

A voice still and small, as of peace. 
Spoke clear in the marvelous silence, 

"Thy vision the Lord shall increase. 

[H] 



"Look forth in the valley below thee, 
Look down at thy feet on the soil, — 

Behold what the winds of Jehovah 

Have wrested from thee for their spoil. 

"They scatter the slope and the valley — 
Dead branches that hung like a frown — 

No longer ye raised them to Heaven ; 

Ye could not, yourselves, lay them down. 

"And yonder the ranks that are fallen 

Were fair as the fairest to see, 
But rotten and weak at the center, 

They perished, unworthy of thee. 

"Those boughs that were sunken with fruitage 
Have learned it is better to give 

Their burden of life and of beauty 
That something below them may live. 

This rugged stem wounded with lightning — 
'T will reach through the ages to come 

A luminous hand in the darkness 
To point the lost wanderer home. 

"And he that was pride of the forest, 
That fell in his beauty and power. 

Has bridged the black chasm of peril 
That lay in thy depths till this hour. 

[12] 



"And lo, one who socks for the summit 
This moment the broad trunk has trod 

And hastens with joy to the heavens 
And stands in the presence of God." 

Then calm in the hallowed silence 
The forest uplifted the strain, 

"Thy mercy endureth forever! 
Amen, and forever, Amen!" 



[13] 



NATURE AND PRAYER 

I LOVE to brood on a river 

And feel that God is calm 
And that He pours forever 

A life-restoring balm. 

I love to bend o'er a blossom 
And feel that God is pure, 

That on his tender bosom 
My soul may rest secure. 

I love to stand in a forest 
And feel that God is great 

And hark the anthem chorused 
Through aisles of native state. 

I love to look on a mountain 

And feel God is sublime 
And find my soul abound in 

The strength to rise and climb. 

I love to roam o'er the prairie 
And feel that God is wide, 

Nor time nor space can carry 
My soul beyond his side. 

I love to walk by the ocean 
And feel that God is strong, 

That through earth's vast commotion 
Right yet must conquer wrong. 
[14] 



I love to gaze on the night sky 
And feel that God is wise, 

Until it grow a bright sky 
Lumined with Paradise. 

And oft I love to bow me 
Alone before my God, 

Until He stoop to show me 
The comfort of his rod. 



[15] 



TO A CAGED BIRD 

Thou little restless form 
That chlrpest in thy cage, 

Thou wast not made to feel the storm, 
Or know the wild wind's rage. 

Nay, cruel were the sin 

To send thee forth to roam — 

Thou wouldst be lost and frightened in 
The oak tree's leafy dome. 

Thou couldst not find thy food, 

Nor rustic fount to sup, 
But I must choose thee what is good 

And bring it in a cup. 

Thou couldst not read the signs 
And wonders that foretold. 

In livid flames and hazy lines, 
The coming of the cold; 

Nor o'er the shivering wood 
Couldst wing thy distant way; 

Nor guess if greener forests stood 
In Maine or Paraguay. 

Thou hast forgot the spring 
Of splendor veiled in showers ; 

Thou hast forgot the eager wing 
That fanned the budding flowers. 

[16] 



Thy wilder note is hushed, 

And let the art of man — 
The freedom of thy nature crushed — 

Restore it if she can. 

O there are human birds 

Shut in their houses strong, 
Who never know the depth of words, 

As thou dost not of song. 

Their mouths are filled with mirth. 

With wit and learning sage, 
But they have never seen God's earth 

That lies beyond their cage. 

They have forgot the sounds 

By woodland muses thrilled ; 
They have forgot the spreading grounds 

Their stalwart fathers tilled. 

O let me be the bird 

That joyous builds her nest 
Where all the blasts of March are heard, 

And warms it with her breast ! 

Who does not fear to dwell 

Beneath the open sky. 
But feels her song in rapture swell 

At its infinity ! 

[17] 



Whose lamps are stars above, 
Whose floor the blooming sod, 

Whose only prison walls are love, 
Whose minister is God! 



[18] 



TO A WREN 

Wee birdie, do not flit — 

I own I'm wrong 
To be so heavy knit 

With care; thy song 

Bubbling from its golden springs, 

Falls in bright rain 
Such as warms frost-bound things 

To life again. 

Drenched in my prison-room, 

I, too, relent ; 
Of mine own wintry gloom 

And fear repent. 

My opening heart doth drink, 

Nor wonders how 
The Lord of Life bade think 

On such as thou! 



[19] 



NEIGHBOR ORIOLE 

Neighbor oriole, if you knew 

How your singing thrills my heart, 

You'd not hide yourself from view 
With so shy an art. 

Why can you not feel my smile? 

Why can my heart's love not reach 
Back again and yours beguile 

With my human speech? 

I would have you come and build 
Here in mine your nest of joy, 

Where the tempest's wrack is stilled, 
Where no foes annoy. 

You should have a downy bed 
And your little ones should grow 

Unafraid, unfailing fed. 
Spite of drouth or snow. 

So you would but be my guest. 
You should come and go at will. 

Homing from each airy quest 
All my house to fill 

With the Heaven of your song, 
Till a nest of singing grew 

Even within my breast, made strong 
By that rapture true; 
[20] 



All my hours of gloom to soothe 
With that liquid tenderness ; 

Waking deeper founts of youth 
Through my deep distress. 

Ah, God knows, no doubt, I care 

For you thus but selfishly ; 
So He smiles and keeps you there 

With Him in the sky. 

Or, perhaps. He means to call 

Me from out my dark house through 

Your wild singing, and enthrall 
Me with Heaven, too. 



[21] 



THREE WINDOWS 

Three windows men look through on Paradise : 
The first is the clear crystal of the skies; 
The second is a maiden's lifted eyes; 
The third the cross whereon the Lord Christ 
dies. 

For him who blots from men the firmament, 
Who taints with shame those glances innocent, 
Who mocks the hope of sinners penitent, 
'Twere better he in blackest Hell were pent. 



[22] 



MODERN MOTHER 

Lowly down I bow before thee, 

Offspring of my human love, 
All my hoarded heart outpour thee, 

For thou, too, art from above ! 

Angel with the lily wand 
Whispered me in words immortal. 

Words none else could understand. 
Thou hadst slipped the heavenly portal! 

Never heard I sounds of singing 

Such as rang above thy birth; 
Never saw I starlight flinging 

Such pure luster o'er the earth; 

Never felt I love so deep, 
Never peace so richly broken. 

As we thrilled with 'round thy sleep, 
As fell on thy crib, unspoken! 

Surely Heaven has opened upon us ! 

Surely in thine innocence 
The Immaculate hath won us 

To abiding penitence ! 

Surely in thy life begins 
All the power of recreation 

That shall cleanse us from our sins. 
That shall work in us salvation ! 



[2S] 



Lowly Babe of Bethlehem's manger, 

Thou dost scorn it not in me 
That I find this heavenly stranger 

In my bosom, type of Thee! 

'Tis thy halo on his brow; 
'Tis thine angels singing o'er him; 

'Tis thy love within us now. 
As we lay our gifts before hii 



nm 



[24 1 



THE CHILD AND I 

I WALKED with bent, contracted brow 

Preoccupied and slow, 

When up there ran a little child, 
And with an absent instinct mild, 
Half vacantly, I smiled. 

And all her face beamed up in mine 

With its blue eyes ashine 

With joy to shame my senses dull, 
So little of ''love's miracle" 
Had filled her heart so full ! 

And Thou, O God, dost smile on me 

As I were all to Thee, 

And in thy love's divinest ray 
I grope disconsolate, and stray, 
And empty turn away! 



[25] 



SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS 

O SIT not chill and cheerless, 
But fill thy house with light ; 

Nor let thine eye be tearless, 
But gather in thy sight 

Thy dear beloved, and fearless 
A stranger more invite! 

Pile high the roaring ingle; 
Set forth the feast and bring 

The fir-tree in to mingle 

Your hearts in magic ring, 

While children's voices tingle- 
To-day a Child is King! 

O think not on the morrow 
And have not any care; 

In mirth drown every sorrow 
And joyous holly wear; 

Of childhood's heart go borrow 
An hour of glee most rare ! 

And let's forget the grudges 
That yesterday we bore; 

And he that harshly judges. 
Let him do so no more ; 

And he that blindly drudges, 
Let him to-day give o'er. 

[26] 



Hold high the cup of gladness ; 

Let every heart o'erflow ; 
Sing out the holy madness 

Of angels long ago, 
Till all the world of sadness 

Thrills to its core of woe. 

For Christ is born from Heaven, 
The Gift beyond degree: 

A Son to us is given 

And King of Love is He; 

His kingdom is as leaven 
That works in you and me. 



[27] 



THORNS 

Once the young thorns grew tender 

Upon the Hebrew hills, 
As soft and green and slender 

As grass beside the rills. 

But when the days were ended 
That they were fully grown, 

Like barbs of steel they blended 
To form the Savior's crown. 

O selfish thoughts deceiving. 

That look so little now. 
Another crown are weaving 

To pierce his holy brow. 

Then crush the thorn-plant springing, 
O Child, within thy heart. 

And palms of joy and singing 
Shall in his praises start. 



[28] 



A TOAST 

Here's a health 

(And no stealth!) 

To the full dinner pail 

And the empty jail, 

To a song and a stride, 

To a warm fireside. 

To children and wife, 

To the pure joys of life, 

To peace and content, 

To a manhood unspent. 

To the head's clear command. 

To the skill of the hand. 

To the heart's open span — 

To the wealth of a man ! 
Come, clink it and drink it, in nature's own 

spirit — 
Pure water, health's fountain — all cheer it! 



[29] 



WHAT COURAGE? 

There is a courage that is born of pride, 
Emblazoned forth in purple and in gold, 

That tramples down the weak with lofty stride 
And cries to all the nations to behold. 

There is a courage that is born of love, 
Once on the painful cross of Calvary won. 

That strains in blood to lift the world above 
And cries aloud in faith, "It shall be done!" 

What courage bears us o'er the western sea? 

What shout of ours awakes the watery miles? 
What faith upbears them, O our God, to 
Thee— 

Those lands of Promise — those Pacific Isles? 



[30] 



THANKSGIVING, 1898 

In the Spring the sturdy farmer 

Strewed in earth his seeds of gold, 
Now the plenteous hand of nature 

Yields him back a hundred fold; 
The fields are all unburdened, 

As the weary beast, for rest ; 
The farmer sits by his fireside: 

The name of the Lord be blest ! 

In the Spring the patriot soldier 

Scattered lead beyond the sea 
And the harvest of his sowing 

Is a people's liberty; 
Now is the bloodstained island 

Where Spanish cannon blazed 
Alight with freedom's banner: 

The name of the Lord be praised! 

In the Spring the loving mother 

Kissed the son she bore in pain 
And in second mortal travail 

She delivered him again ; 
Her solemn, silent harvest. 

The harvest of the slain: 
God's pity on the mothers 

Who weep to-day like rain! 



[31] 



DEAD ! * 

He whom we love is dead! 

Our Chief — our chosen Guide^ — 
Another martyr patriot soul has sped 

Out on the unseen tide! 

Dead in a time of peace ! 

Dead in an hour of joy! 
Dead as they thronged him in their love's in- 
crease, 

Past murder to destroy! 

Bowed down with grief and shame, 

Bereaved, the nation waits; 
Her 'wildered children but repeat his name 

About the city gates. 

Saying, "O flag he loved, 

Droop from your lofty mast ; 
Droop, till the last vain babbler is reproved 

And pride to woe has past !" 

Saying, "O face of him, 

Look from the darkness yet, 
Calm as of old ; our throbbing eyes are dim ; 

Our cheeks are passion wet !" 

* 1901. 



[32] 



O God, and must it be — 

We bid the stranger come, 
And find, instead of angel ministry, 

A serpent's in our home? 

O how earth faints to-day! 

How pours our anguished breath 
To Him the dear dead, living to obey, 

Could seek his face in death! 

Lo, He is by our side; 

We fall before his feet ; 
"Hadst Thou been here, our brother had not 
died," 

Our broken tones repeat. 

"We heard thy Voice say 'Come !' 

We echoed forth the word — 
'Come, make the land of liberty thy home! 

Let him come who hath heard !' " 

O hearing, had we heard 

That Voice, "Come unto Me," 
This were our cry, "O come unto the Lord! 

Let the Son make you free!" 

If this be not our cry. 

By her three martyred chiefs. 
The fair Republic sinks in anarchy. 

Foul crimes and unbeliefs ! 
[33] 



THE YELLOW CURSE 

NOT the yellow plague 

Wherewith the south winds scourge 
Our coasts to east, nor west 

What yellow perils surge — 
But what from our own gates 

We have not strength to purge: 

The yellow scandal sheet; 

The yellow spectacle, 
Speech, picture, song, that make 

The yellow play-house spell; 
The yellow drink saloon, 

Dance maelstrom, white-slave Hell. 

And I say our young men's strength 

Is wasted at its spring; 
And I say our maidens' lips 

Do touch the unclean thing; 
And our dotards lick it up. 

As a dog its vomiting. 

And my soul is sick in me 

And I may not hold my peace. 

For the wounds of this great scourge 
Do everywhere increase, 

And its putrefying sores 

Are a stench that does not cease. 

[34] 



And I say the root of all 
Is the yellow lust of gold, 

And while we reach our hands 

Are our sons and daughters sold, 

Soul and body, in our sight, 
And we will not loose our hold. 

And I say it is an age 

That has no saving sight, 

Wherein the price of blood 
Is thirty pieces bright. 

And the God of it is less 

Than a cup that turns aright. 

For I know, Lord Christ, if Thou 
Were once within our thought, 

We could not see the souls 

For which thy passion wrought, 

Nor thy broken body's flesh. 
So lightly sold and bought. 



[35] 



OUR PEACE 

America, unto thee flow 

All nations now, with one accord, 
Trusting in thee at last to know 

That mountain of the Lord. 

In thy new world the old world meets, 
Seeking the final truth of men. 

Desiring, in thy city streets 
Even, to be born again. 

Yea, thou dost travail to beget 

A living body and one soul 
Of ends of all the earth, and set 

Christ's peace upon the whole. 

And if thou labor not in vain, 
But loose in love the races furled 

In the new birth of thy domain. 
Thou dost it for the world. 

But Thou, O Prince of Peace, must give 
Us godlike strength, to agonize 

In faith of the unseen, and live 
Through deathly sacrifice. 



[36] 



MY COUNTRY'S KING 

Once lying lips of state declared, 

*'Wc have no king but Caesar," when 

They braved their Heaven-sent King and dared 
Deny Him before men. 

But for my land it hath sufficed — 
And O, may this her glory be — 

To own Thee through the world, great Christ, 
And have no King but Thee ! 



[37] 



OF SUCH IS THE KINGDOM 

'Tis well our little ones should know 
The laws of numbers and of words, 

And pull in pieces flowers to show 
Their parts, and mark the birds. 

'Tis needful they should glibly say 

What cities through the earth abound. 

And name each distant peak and bay. 
And tell why earth is round; 

Explain about her inner heat 

And outer oceans, storms and shocks ; 

Describe her rivers, and repeat 
The Latin names of rocks ; 

And answer why the sky is blue. 
And how the planets are not stars, 

And how they move and shine, and who 
Discovered lines on Mars. 

'Twould not be just were they not taught 
How states of old arose and fell. 

What bloody heroes raged and fought 
And filled the earth with Hell ; 

Or how, more wise, in modern times, 

A nobler race of heroes stood 
To war against those ancient crimes 

And for the common good. 
[38] 



But He who is the Life of all, 

Upon whose cross turns history, 

Without whose inward help we fall, 
Whose truth alone makes free — 

To whom all might of earth is weak, 
To whom all light of earth is dim, — • 

They may not of His glories speak 
Nor learn to come to Him. 

Even the mothers now no more 
Gather their little ones from play 

To come to the great Master, nor 
His blessing on them pray. 

No more He takes them in his arms. 
No more his hands that heal and bless 

Forestall the sicknesses and harms 
With their divine caress. 

Nay, blinder, wickeder than they 

Who would not children should annoy 

The Lord, we suffer not to-day 
Himself to touch our boy. 

Our fathers, who upon this sod 
Planted a nation free and true. 

In knowledge and in fear of God — 
What would they say, think you, 

[39] 



To see the generation we 

Are rearing, like the godless fool. 
With heathen lust for liberty. 

Bred in a Christless school? 

No politician I, nor one 

That evil gladly prophesies, 

Yet know, for this that we have done, 
Our land shall pay the price! 

A price that even now begins 

To take her life, and none can stay- 

Of unbelief and nameless sins. 
Foul crimes, and swift decay ! 



[40] 



TEACH US TO PRAY 

The world absorbs us wholly ; we are as 

Children, whose minds are bounded all with 

play, 
Heedless of the great care the father has : 
Teach us to pray, O Christ, teach us to pray ! 

Our lives are in the things that we possess ; 

Our cheapened bodies less than their display ; 
Our meat is more than that it nourishes: 

Teach us to pray, O Christ, teach us to pray ! 

Yea, we consume our neighbor in his need. 
Unmindful how God sends the blessed day 

On all — mocking his mercy with our greed: 
Teach us to pray, O Christ, teach us to pray ! 

No more Heaven's light is on us, who no more 
Desire to walk by its life-giving ray; 

Lost is the sight of that immortal shore: 
Teach us to pray, Christ, teach us to pray! 



[41] 



MORNING COLLECT 

Father, we thank Thee for the morning light; 
We thank Thee for the truth that we may 

know; 
We thank Thee for our might, found in thy 

might ; 
We thank Thee for our labor in Thy sight ; 
We trust Thee for the increase as we sow; 
Grant us Thy blessing now, and with us go. 



[42] 



MORNING PRAYER 

Father, I would that I might see 

Thy will toward me; 
That from mine eyes the scales might fall 

And I behold 

Thy truth in all 
Its ancient strength of purity, 

With power untold 

To make me free. 

Father, I would that I might be 

Forgot in Thee; 
That all my soul were open so 

To thy love's glow 
That everything I say 

And do, this day. 
Might flow from Thee, through me. 



[43] 



ASSURANCE 

Thou, Father, canst not lose thy child, 
For though he pass, unmarked of men, 
Through surging street or wilding glen, 

His steps to Thee are still defiled. 

Or if he toss the rolling sea. 
Or lost in deepest mine explore. 
Or languish on a foreign shore. 

He still is near and dear to Thee. 

Or whelmed by tempests if he shout 
Unheard in sounding wind and flood. 
Or thirsty deserts drink his blood. 

Thy saving care will find him out. 

The elements, at thy command. 

Shall render back whom Thou begot. 
And death and Hell shall hold him not. 

And none shall pluck him from thy Hand. 



[44] 



SATISFACTION 

A RED day broke: the fanner crawled 
Mole-eyed through his furrows ; densely palled 

In stupors lay the town ; but wide 
Fluttered one attic window high 
Where a lone heart drank the brimming sky ; — 

And God was satisfied. 

Dark aeons lapsed : the ceaseless moil 
Of nature's forces wrought a toil 

Unknown, unknowing, blindly pent; 
At length arose the mind to con 
Rock, field and flood, and think thereon; 

And God was well content. 

A priceless life was lost in ways 
Of pain and want and little praise. 

Nor ever bartered hope for pelf. 
But battled on ; nor ever came 
Into its own; God smiled, for fame. 

And took it to Himself. 



[45] 



THE HEART OF STONE 

O THAT my heart were softened, that its crust 

Of gathered artifice were shook to dust ! 

That its cold central stone 

Once more might groan, 

Smitten beneath the hand that wieldeth pain, 

Till it should throb again, 

Till it should break afresh, 

A heart of flesh! 

O that my guilt were opened, that its core 

Were blazed through earth and sky 

And on the farthest shore ; 

That whosoever looked me in the eye 

Might there explore 

The secret of my inmost shame, and cry, 

"Unclean! Unclean!" and flee 

My livid leprosy! 

O that repentance like an avalanche 

Would shatter me; would tear me, root and 

branch. 
From out this bedded past; would sweep me 

hence 
To that great Valley where experience 
Is sifted, and the sacred seed of soul 
Plucked forth, alone and whole! 

Behold I, who betrayed 
My soul's deep trust, have prayed ! 
[46] 



Is there no arm that wieldeth pain? 

Is there no eye to know my stain? 

Is there no power to strike repentance down 

Where strong desire has grown? 

Great God, I cry, I cry ! 

By my own guilt I try 

Thy Being, and I know that Thou art nigh! 

I utter all to Thee— 

Know Thou my infamy — 

Yea, every thought of me ! 

Search all my hidden part — 

Beat down my barren heart — 

Lash from its lethargy 

The latent smart! 

Let thy face shine on me, God, as Thou art. 

Fearful in holiness. 

Till I confess! 

So may repentance come to me at last ; 

So may I break these bands of death, and cast 

Them from me in the furnace of Thy wrath ; 

So may that seething bath, 

Dissolving all that time hath wrought, and 

shame. 
Go through me, like a flame; 
Leave me renewed ; 
Leave my heart dewed 
With the lost faith and truth. 
Reverence, love, humility, of youth ! 
[47] 



NEW LIFE 

Light from out of night. 

Whence unfurled, 
Issuing with might 

On the world — 
Lifting drench and gloom 

Into bloom — 
Thrilling air with voice 

To rejoice! 

Lily from the mud, 

How camest thou, 
Pure expanding bud, 

Bursting now — 
Spreading all thy white 

To the light- 
Baring all thy heart 

To its dart? 

Lily maiden, sprung 

From hard loins, 
Toil and travail wrung — 

Say, how coins 
Nature from such mints 

Such fair tints — 
Virgin ecstasy. 

Cheek and eye? 



[48] 



God, who dost create 

All things new, 
Dost regenerate. 

Wash with dew, 
Sullied light and life, 

After strife. 
Giving a new birth 

To all earth- 
See me where I stand — 

Where I bow — 
Burning with the brand 

On my brow — 
Darkened all within 

By my sin — 
Sinking 'neath the weight 

Of its fate ; — 

Enter into me 

With thy might- 
Wash me — set me free 

In thy sight ; — 
Let me yield and die 

Where I lie — 
Breathe in me thy true 

Life anew. 



[49] 



CRY OF THE SPIRIT 

O MY Maker, make me strong! 
Wildering this press and throng, 
And its way unfathomed long! 

Make me strong to seek thy Face 
In the secret, inner place — 
In the cloud lines of a race ; 

Strong to own a darkened span, 
Yielding not my spark of man, 
Doubting not thy larger plan; 

Strong to trust when tumults sway; 
Strong to weep, and still to pray ; 
Strong to wait the fuller day ; 

Strong for all unselfish heed ; 
Strong to give, from out my need ; 
Strong to smile while pulses bleed ; 

Strong to wreck not of the strain. 
Finding Thou art more than pain, 
Death is higher birth again. 

O my Maker, make me strong! 
Men and years to Thee belong! 
Tune me to their endless song! 

[50] 



A PSALM OF THE SPIRIT 

What am I, that I should fail? 
Not of mine own self I came 
And my wisdom cannot frame 
All I may be; I but know 
Paths by which I came do glow: 
Royal lineage is mine, 
Reaching back to the divine! 

What shall bid my bosom quail? 

For a strength I cannot plumb 
Unto mine own strength doth come 
Underneath an Arm I feel ; 
At a touch of Love I kneel, 
And my heart, from strong desire, 
Leaps to sudden flames of fire ! 

Naught can over me prevail ! 

Thou, O God, dost succor me 
By thy Spirit; I am free; 
What I find to do I can ; 
None can hinder — fiend nor man ; 
They who set themselves my foes 
Thine omnipotence oppose! 



[51] 



THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT 

No cold blade thou of deadly steel, 
But living brand of breath of God, 

That wounds and scarifies to heal 
And buds, like Aaron's rod. 

Yea, though in wrath thou smitest sore, 
In mercy, more than surgeon's knife, 

For as thou rendest to the core. 
Thou givest life. 



[52] 



REVELATION 

Out of the heart of being, 
Out of the deep unknown, 

Into the world of seeing, 
He came, unto his own. 

All starlight dim and hoary 
In Him did gathered shine ; 

He was the longed-for glory 
And Son of the Divine. 

And yet they took and slew Him- 
They crushed Him on a tree — 

Because they never knew Him, 
Nor having eyes, did see. 

But when his heart was broken 
And Heaven went out in night, 

Then they confest the token 
He was the God of Light. 



[53] 



UNCHANGED 

When we behold the scatheless youth 
That clothed Him as He trod, 

Our hearts still cry aloud the truth — 
"Behold the Lamb of God!" 

Still, still, with impulse true and warm, 
Our souls transcend the clod 

And own his resurrection form — 
"My Master, and my God!" 



[54] 



THE PRESENT NEED 

Speak not of ism nor seism, nor 

Of changeless creed 

Nor flawless screed; 

I know the need — 
I know what this age fainteth for: 

The Christ of God, 

Who lowly trod, 
Who lived and died and rose again 
And ever lives and prays for men. 

Break down the centuries, ye hands 

That guard the things of life — where stands 

The Saviour, point ye out the way: 

Naught hath sufficed 

Till we, today. 
Have touched again the living Christ. 



[55] 



SON OF MAN 

O THOU who wert the Son 
Of Man, Thou knowest this 

Our life, nor needst that anyone 
Tell Thee what in us is! 

Our fell ambition's fire; 

The world that would enmesh 
Our souls ; the weakness, strong desire, 

And shrinking of our flesh, — 

All these Thou feltest, too ; 

Yet freely, without sin, 
Walkedst our earth ways, even to 

The grave, and entering in 

Didst break its bands and rise 
Conqueror o'er all our foes, 

And perfect glory of the skies 
Before us didst disclose. 

Therefore we cry to Thee 

In all our human need 
And hope in thy great life to be 

Alive and free indeed! 



[56] 



PEACE, BE STILL! 

Once the sea of tumbling waves, 

Stung and startled by the wind. 
Lashing from its hidden caves, 

Found One standing, unconfined. 
In the fury — through the roar 

Heard his "Peace, be still !" and from 
Tumult ceasing, to the core, 

Sunk and settled into calm. 

So humanity's vast sea. 

Torn by passion, blindly wrought, 
At its heart, unquenchably. 

Finds the working of his thought; 
Through all agitations hears 

His unfettered "Peace, be still !" 
Shame its raging, calm its fears, 

Master all its restless will. 



[57] 



STANZAS FOR A HOSPITAL 

O HAPPIEST of men, whose fate 
Upon some bed of pain to lie, 

Or wander, leprous, desolate. 
Where Jesus Christ passed by ! 

Ye weak and worn and weary ones, 
Here doth his pathway reappear; 

And with the passing of the suns, 
O may ye find Him here! 



[68] 



THE RIDDLE OF THE NAZARENE 

I AM lost in saving, 

Found in giving; 
Hid to pride of knowing, 
Known in living; 
Who my blessed power would win 
Must have felt the curse of sin. 



[59] 



MY WITNESS 

Out of the unseen mystery 

Into the mystery seen, 
The world and life and history, 

I come — what doth it mean? 

I question the deep waters — 
They cannot answer me ; 

Not all heaven's starry daughters 
Can give me light to see. 

I ask the long procession 

That come from the world's dawn 
Into this vast possession 

A moment, and are gone: 

Their words are a confusion 

Of many gods and none 
Till all seems a delusion 

And snare, beneath the sun. 

I mark each world upheaval 

Subsiding in the pit ; 
Muse on all good and evil. 

And cannot fathom it. 

My desolate soul breaketh 

To know a God above; 
Some voice within me waketh 

And crieth for his love. 
[60] 



Then down the clouds of glory 

And over the wild sea, 
Out from all ancient story 

And all that is to be, 

One Form divine, resistless, 

Emerges on my soul, 
That erst distraught or listless. 

Leaps up to be made whole. 

Thou Son of God, my being 
Declares Thee, who Thou art ! 

In thy light I have seeing. 
All secrets of my heart 

Come from their graves with trembling. 

All devilish sins confess ; 
All doubt and all dissembling 

Fade in thy perfectness ! 

Thy love as lightning reaches 

My spirit through the clod 
And claims it thine, and teaches 

Me love and Thou art God ! 

The world is filled with Heaven; 

All earth and sky and sea 
Perceive the quickening leaven 

And live and move in Thee! 

[61] 



What questioning remaineth? 

What longing unfulfilled? 
What hope but He attaineth? 

What doubt but He hath stilled? 

O ye that have not known Him 
Are deaf and blind and dumb; 

Awake, O dead, and own Him 
And Heaven shall fully come! 



[63] 



JESUS, I COME TO THEE 

Jesus, I come to Thee, 
Leave all the world for Thee, 
Yield all myself to Thee — 
Grant but Thyself to me ! 

Grant but Thyself to me ! 
Be the new heart of me, 
Shed thy great life in me. 
Till I live new in Thee ! 

Till I live new in Thee, 
Quickened, impelled, by Thee ; 
Till Thou be formed in me, 
And I do show forth Thee! 



[63] 



FRIEND OF SINNERS 

Friend of Sinners, faithful Friend, 
Leave me not, unto the end! 

Others flatter to my shame ; 
Thou dost show me what I am: 

How my good is not the best — 
How my ill goes unconfest; 

Or, if I am mocked of them, 
Thou alone dost not condemn. 

Deep among the toil, the strife, 
The anguish at my core of life. 

Thou searchest still, and findst in me 
The germ of whom I yet may be. 

Thou lovest such an one, and I 
Feel him leap in me for reply. 

Friend of Sinners, faithful Friend, 
Love, rebuke me, to the end; 

Till this flesh-veil fade and fall 
And I find Thee all in all ! 



[64] 



CONFESSION 

Jesus, I have fallen In sin : 
Now I think on Thee, chagrin 
Of hurt pride is not the worst 
Pang I feel, but that I durst 
Take upon myself thy name 
And put Thee to an open shame ! 

Jesus, in my secret heart, 

I have thought ill : Thou who art 

All my life, too late I see 

I have 'reft my soul of Thee, 

Sent thy Spirit from my flesh 

And wounded thy great heart afresh ! 

Jesus, in the clamorous crowd, 
I have shrunk, confused and cowed, 
Doubting thy divine control: 
Now Thou lookest on my soul, 
I confess my deep disgrace, 
Who denied Thee to thy Face! 

Yet what can I do but come 
Back to Thee, my only home? 
Thou dost call me by thy word 
And I know Thou art the Lord ! 
Yea, I love Thee, Thou dost know. 
Spite of all my bitter woe ! 

[65] 



Save me from the miry clay! 
Save me from the secret way! 
Save me from the storms that rave! 
Pluck my feet from out the grave ! 
Make me strong, at last, and free, 
Like a rock to stand for Thee ! 



[66] 



STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS 

Lord, not for my sake, 
Who am so little worth. 

Who am but formed to wake 
And perish in the earth — 

Who shake in every wind, 
Who am as water poured, 

As vapor unconfined. 

That cannot be restored — 

Not for my sake I pray 
Or strive, from sore defeat, 

To rise and tread the way 
Of thy remembered feet, 

But for thy sake alone. 

Who loved me and who died, 

If Thou at last be shown 
In me, and glorified. 

1 love thee. Lord, nor doubt 
That virtue can appeal, 

Nor frailty — I fade out; 
Thou growest all in all. 



[67] 



OUT OF THE DEPTHS 

When my helpless boat has toiled 
Darkened hours where waters boiled, 
And my straining oars but sleep, 
Held and baffled in the deep — 
When the wind is at its height — 
In the darkest hour of night — 
Then it is Thou comest to me, 
Jesus, walking on the sea! 

When my soul by doubt is torn 

And I shudder back forlorn. 

Dreading, in mine agony, 

By some spectral foe to die — 

Then it thy Voice I hear, 

"Fear not: it is I: have cheer!" 

Then I fall and cry to Thee, 

"Lord, come into the boat with me!" 

Then Thou comest, and thy will 
Makes the winds and waters still. 
While thy Being I adore. 
Straightway are we at the shore ! 
Ruler, Thou, of wind and wave — 
They shall never be my grave — 
Lord, I put my trust in Thee I 
Evermore my Pilot be! 



[68] 



MORNING WATCH 

Jesus, ere the night depart, 
Shed thy light within my heart; 
Ere the world of men touch me, 
Let me feel the touch of Thee. 

Seal in me that inner light. 
So to scan the day aright ; 
Charge me, in the world of men, 
To put forth that touch again. 



[69] 



NOONDAY PRAYER 

Master, my ear grows jaded; 
From my mind 

The clear, true tone has faded- 
Let me find 

Thy silence settle round me 

As I pray, 
The discords that confound me 

Die away. 

Hush me, till new dilating, 

All my soul 
Moves to thy love's vibrating. 

Sure control. 



[70] 



EVENING PRAYER 

Night over one more day ! 

Christ, who oft didst pray 
Out on some mountain height, 

Star-lamps hung round about, 
Man and his sin and doubt 
For a brief hour shut out — 
Teach me to pray aright! 

In the wide earth no rest — 
No rest within my breast ! 

I climb to solitude 
Where the far star-lamps shine, 
Hungry for the divine 
Communion that was thine — 

Alone with the All-Good. 

1 feel Thee come and stand 
And take me by the hand 

And breathe my voiceless prayer, 
Until the calm returns, 
While the whole heaven burns, 
And all my spirit yearns 

To meet thine, bare. 

My soul bows down to Thee, 
Divine Epiphany, 

That bendest low to such 

[71] 



As come by weary stealth 
To Thee ; all life and health, 
Peace, joy, all Heaven's wealth, 
Flow from thy touch 1 

Forgive the vision lost 
This day, the spirit tost. 

The fear and wrong; 
Lo, I come back to Thee, 
Loving Thee utterly; 
Send me to-morrow free 

Forth to the throng! 



[ ^S 1 



TO A YOUNG CONVERT 

Jesus is thy light 

And thy way ; 
Jesus is thy might 

And thy stay. 

Though all nature paint 

Darkness, now ; 
Tliough thy heart be faint, 

Fear not thou. 

Holding to his hand, 

Thou art pure; 
Doing his command, 

Free and sure. 

In his love thou hast 

All things thine; 
Loving Him, at last, 

Thou'rt divine. 



[73] 



I WOULD YOU KNEW MY MASTER 

I WOULD you knew my Master — 
His worth is more than all 

Men may conceive, and vaster 
As they upon Him call. 

His smile is Heaven's breaking; 

His touch is Heaven's might; 
He thrills the world to waking; 

He gives the blind eyes sight. 

His words are Heaven's manna; 

His love is Heaven's gold; 
The nations sing Hosanna 

Whom He has fed of old. 

He buys the slaves and makes them 

Forever God's free-men; 
The dead, when He awakes them. 

They shall not die again. 

He knows the heart of mortal 

And He alone has power 
To enter through its portal 

With Heaven's immortal dower. 

I would you knew my Master — 
His heart for you doth bleed 

Till you from all disaster 
And death in Him be freed. 
[74] 



A THORNY WAY 

A THORNY way, O Christ, thy feet do go, 

And he who follows after 
Must press the thorns, ev'n till the red drops 
flow, 

While mockery and laughter 
Ring in his ears from the loud thoroughfare 

Where the world travels lightly, without care. 

But 0, 'tis Thou dost glimmer on ahead, 
And looking backward beck'nest — 

A look with potency to raise the dead — 
Nor thine own blood-track reck'nest: 

The thorns grow lilies and his wounds divine 

To feel his life-blood flowing down with thine! 



[75] 



CALVARY'S HILL 

In the midst of the ages, 

All shadowy, still, 
Like a tower that engages 

The dark powers of ill. 

Stands Calvary's Hill. 

Away through the dust and 

Fierce heat of the years, 
In their hatred and lust and 

Their blindness of tears. 

Surge the man-swarms earth rears. 

On the hilltop the fashion 

Of a cross doth arise. 
And hung there, with passion 

Divine in his eyes, 

A Son of Man dies. 

From his shattered flesh going, 

The hard trampled clod 
With his life-blood is flowing — 

The stern path He trod 

Grows a river of God. 

Its pulses, descending, 
Increase hour by hour, 

Through centuries spending 
Their tide, till its power 
All earth's arteries dower. 

[76] 



There is virtue and healing 
And infinite love 

In the flood that goes stealing 
From the God-Man above 
To the world's farthest cove. 

Who drinks of this river, 

He finds it within, 
A fountain, forever 

Outpouring, again, 

His own life to men. 

Till the will of the Father 

In each heart be done 
And the warring tribes gather 

Together in one. 

Through the love of the Son, 

Who loved us and gave us 
His life on the tree, 

To quicken and save us, 
And so set us free — 
God's sons, even as He. 



[77] 



CHRIST AND THE PROUD SOUL 

Lordly mortal, 

At thy gate 
I stand knocking — 

Soon or late 
Thou must hear, through 

All thy state. 

High thy palace, 

Thy degree, 
And I am not 

Known to thee. 
And thy porter — 

Hurried he. 

All within is 

Beautiful : 
For thy joyance 

Thou didst cull 
The full flower of 

Many a soul. 

All things hast thou 

For delight: 
Woman's love is 

Thine this night 
And thy children 

Dance in sight. 

[78] 



Thronging, thronging, 
Through thy door. 

Press thy neighbors, 
Me before — 

And not one is 
Sad or poor. 

Yet I know that, 

On a day, 
Shall unbidden 

Pass this way 
One dread form no 

Hand can stay. 

He shall enter 

And demand 
What thou lovest 

Dearest, and 
Thou must yield it 

To his hand. 

Even the beam of 

A clear eye. 
Even the touch of 

Sympathy, 
Even the voice thou 

Livest by. 



[79] 



And the dear fonii 
That moved free 

To some inner 
Mystery, 

Shall lie cold and 
Dead to thee. 

Though thou weep, it 

Cannot hear; 
Though thy neighbors 

Gather near. 
All their words are 

Distant, drear. 

Thou shalt put them 
Forth, and cry, 

Out of thy love's 
Agony, 

Almost yielding 
Thee to die. 

And the silence 

Of the tomb 
Shall ensue, and. 

Through the gloom, 
My lone knocking 

Fill the room. 



[80] 



Then thy soul shalt 
Hear in thee ; 

Thou shalt rise up 
Breathlessly, 

Haste and open 
Unto Me, 

Crying, "Master, 
Didst thou bleed? 

And art living 
At our need? 

Art Thou gate of 
Life, indeed?" 

After that, from 
Out thy door, 

Thou shalt mark the 
Sad and poor, 

And shalt ope to 
Them thy store. 



[81] 



TO AN EARLY SPRING BLOSSOM 

Dear flower that liftest up, 

Here in this rocky dell, 
The glory of thy living cup — 

Thou art a miracle ! 

Earth holds thee not, nor storm 

Doth quell; frail as thou art. 
Thou risest up and findst thy fonn 

And openest thy heart. 

Yet the gay butterfly 

Or dusty gilded bee 
That seeks thee out and sucks thee dry 

Is miracle to thee. 

Life climbs a steep, whose height 

And depth in mystery dwell, 
And 'twixt each stage and next is flight 

Of the impossible. 

There is a life a man 

Feels stir at roots of him, 
Nor all that range below him can 

Once touch that fountain's brim. 

It is not of the earth ; 

It rises on some shore 
Remote, immortal, and its birth 

Is life forevermore. 

[82] 



It bids submit this host, 

This man of flesh, until 
The incoming of the Holy Ghost 

Regenerate his will ; 

To fight, since fight must be, 

And overcome the world, 
With only faith, and look to see 

The peace of God unfurled. 

O had we faith ! — as thou, 

Frail flower, dost spring and blow, 
Bursting our wintry earth-clod now, 

What image might we grow? 

What glory shed abroad 

At life's high pinnacle 
Where spirit reaches up to God, 

And all is possible? 

Of these things not our head 

Nor heart doth yet conceive. 
But One hath lived and wrought and bled 

That so we might believe ; 

Hath yielded up his breath 

And fallen, as a seed, 
Within the rocky tomb of death. 

To bring us life, indeed. 

[83] 



THE UNSEEN KING 

Dim descried among the ages 

Moveth Christ, the King of Men, 

Center of the storm that rages 

Through them; can our darkened ken 

Pierce the turmoil that still wages 
Round Him — find Him out again? 

Yet we all have felt his power 
And the virtue that doth go 

Forth from Him ; have flocked with our 
Evils after Him ; we know 

If we find Him, in that hour 
He will save us: be it so! 

Yea, we all have heard Him speaking. 

For his accents evermore 
With desire are seeking, seeking, 

Men above the loud uproar; 
With authority are breaking 

Where their frenzy broke before. 

In our age He is a presence. 
Yet we long to see his Face; 

Long to know the vital pleasance 
Of his heavenly truth and grace; 

To unfold his omnipresence 
In all features of our race ! 

[84] 



THE KING OF GLORY 

Time was when Christian knights turned back 
On the dark world, to quest afar 

A heavenly shore, whose light was more 
Than mortals dream in sun or star. 

Heroic souls ! Their valor won 
The long crusade, and led the way 

Whereby we stand in that blest land 
And hear the King of Glory say, 

"Return, ye sons of men, return ! 

Take up the swords your sires let fall! 
Each bathe his own before the throne 

In heavenly light, then gather all 

"Without the gate; for this ye came — 
For this my heavenly kingdom see — 

To turn once more to that dark shore 
And conquer earth and men for Me!" 



[85] 



OUR CAPTAIN KING 

We are the armies of King Christ ; 

The King Himself doth lead us on; 
The deserts flow with streams and blow 

With flowers, where we have gone. 

Full many a sink of foul disease, 

That rots and festers in our path, 

When we do smite with swords of light. 
Gives up the dead it hath. 

We cleanse the pools, we slay the beasts 
That prey on human life, but when 

Our weapons touch our brothers, such 
Leap up to life again. 

Yet though Heaven's light streams after us, 
Our Captain looks not back, but sees 

The fight ahead, where turneth red 
The city, to its lees. 

He draws us on into the glare, 
Into the heat and traffic's roar; 

He shineth there surpassing fair — 
He storms the midnight's core. 

Crying back to us, "Follow Me ! 

Ye are my own, my chosen band! 
Strike for your Lord! The heavenly sword 

Shall triumph in your hand!" 
[86] 



Christ God, let us not flinch from Thee! 

Quicken us now with inner might 
To stand and press, mid storm and stress, 

Thy battle through the night; 

Seeing the day that is to dawn, 

When through the street, the mart, the slum. 
The truth is known, thy triumph shown. 

Thy heavenly kingdom come ! 



[87] 



KING OF MEN 

I Ajvi the King of Men ; the world 

Is mine by right of love ; 
And farthest kings bring offerings 

My power supreme to prove. 

My kingdom is not of this world, 

Yet in the world it sows 
Its seeds of might and heavenly light, 

And through the world it grows. 

He most is king who most hath learned 

Of Me to love his own; 
The sovereign state alone is great 

Where my decrees are known. 

I judge between the lands; I sway 

The nations with release 
Of love, till range in interchange 

Of service, all in peace. 

For men to me are men ; I know 

Nor race nor clime ; the Son 
Of Man am I, and draw thereby 

The race of men in one. 

And yet, though King of Kings and Lord 

Of Lords, I walk the ways 
My subjects go, that I may know 

Each toiler, face to face. 
[88] 



ACROSS THE PRAIRIE 

Leagues and leagues of grass 
That stretch to the sky, 

Where the gray dream-ships pass- 
Yet bound am I. 

Fathoms and fathoms of air 

To the silent rest 
Of the spaces, everywhere — 

Yet I am oppressed. 

Steeds of wind and fire 

That mount and flee 
With all my heart's desire — 

Yet I am not free. 



[89] 



II 

IN THE TOWN 

A WINDOW and a hearth 

And one I love, 
And four red walls of earth 

Give room to move. 

A workshop and a tool 

And practiced skill, 
And on a narrow stool 

I work my will. 

A fane, a human hush, 
A voice of prayer — 

And worlds asunder rush. 
For Heaven is there. 



[90] 



ONE IN CHRIST 

O IF the soul could ever reach the height 

To yield its life's full truth in look and tone 

Always and ever — never with a screen 

Of pride or doubt or conscious void between — 

If men were kin, as now are flesh and bone, 

And mingled as the common rays of light ! 

If faith might never waver — if we knew 

With all our strength of thought, that God is 

true, 
And that the human soul is true to Him 
In essence, howsoe'er its light grow dim — 
If we could hold those moments high and few 
When we seem his — and all the wide world, 

too! 

If we could trust our kind as He alone 
Trusted, who walked of old in Palestine; 
Who gave Himself in city, field, or lake. 
To whomsoever had the will to take — 
The Water and the Bread of Life, the Vine, 
The Way, the Truth, the Life, to everyone! 

Who knew the depth of darkness, needed not 
That any should tell Him what was in man ; 
O infinitely pure — infinite pain 
Must wring from Him the drops of bloody rain ; 

[91] 



He knew it all, yet freely He began 
To do and teach — his Father taught Him 
what ! 

Centered and fixed in truth, storms could but 

prove 
The strength of his free spirit: mocked, de- 
spised. 
Betrayed, denied, deserted of his own, 
He trod the bitter wine-press all alone. 
And rising, claimed of all, and agonized 
Peter, the worship and the works of love! 

O Christ, we feel thy love inflame our own! 
In Thee we rise, and break the bands of fear ; 
Thy light of truth we see, O Christ, we see, 
In power divine to set our spirits free ! 
We walk and leap and own thy Godhead, clear 
Of the impotence which all our life has known ! 

O strong at last in thy love's conquering might, 
May we not stand confest upon the earth 
The sons of God? May we not clear away 
With hands of love and faith, the blinding clay 
That binds our brother, till a new, free birth 
The sons of men with Thee in God unite? 



[92] 



BLIND OF SPIRIT 

O THAT mine eyes might see the Lord divine ! 

O that mine ears might hear his accents 
sweet ! 
O that some costly spikenard were mine, 

That I might pour it on his weary feet! 

How would I wipe them with my cov'ring 
hair — 

Judas and the disciples all forgot — 
How would I break my soul to Him in prayer, 

Enraptured at his word, "Rebuke her not!" 

O blind of spirit I Shall we never see 

The living present with its certain task, 

But still demand, with sons of Zebedee, 

The impossible? We know not what we 
ask! 

Great Christ, teach Thou our hearts a humbler 
prayer. 
Worked out through hands and lips and 
bended knee 
Before thy mortal suffering, everywhere, 

And through thy human garment touching 
Thee! 



[98] 



LOAVES AND FISHES 

Dear Christ, the hungry multitude 

Bids all within us rise, 
For our feet stand where Thou hast stood 

And Thou dost light our eyes. 

We see them fainting, scattered far, 
Their own need half unknown, 

As sheep without a shepherd are — 
Thy burden in us grown. 

Our hearts leap up at Thy command, 

"Give ye to them to eat," 
But see how paltry in our hand 

Our basketful of meat ! 

Our loaves and fishes, what are they 

Among so many. Lord? 
How can we send them filled away 

Who can so scant afford.? 

Yet in thy face sufficiency 

Of every good we find. 
And bring our little store to Thee 

With free and trusting mind. 

Thou canst not fail — we know not how, 

Nor question overmuch — 
But all Thou touchest, this we know, 

Increases at thy touch. 
[94] 



Bless Thou, O Christ, our humble food, 

Our fishes and our bread ; 
So shall the hungry multitude 

Abundantly be fed. 

Bless Thou, O Christ, our human good 

With thy divinity; 
So shall the hungry multitude 

Feed in their hearts on Thee ! 



[95] 



INSCRIPTION FOR A CHURCH DOOR 

Dost know our Master? O stand not without! 
Soul of our soul — thou canst but be at home; 
Rest here, unfold thy heart and speak of Him! 

Dost know Him not? O enter, in his name! 
We bid thee welcome as thou wert Himself 
And pray thou find Him in this house of his! 



[96] 



A SONG OF GOD'S HOUSE 

God in our hearts doth call 

And bids us gather here; 
He is tlie Father of us all 

And we are brothers dear. 

Christ Jesus, his dear Son, 
Has opened wide the door — 

Makes us joint heirs with Him, each one- 
He would not have one poor. 

Here must we freely give 

All men an unfeigned love, 
Seeing the very life we live 

Comes down from God above. 

Yea, each must fully know 

His life as ours is priced. 
Seeing that all we have we owe 

Unto our Brother, Christ. 

For so are we God's sons, 

Bound up by Christ's new birth 

In brotherhood, that through us runs 
Transforming all the earth; 

Bringing the sons of strife 

To gather without fear 
Into one family, whose life 

Rises and centers here. 
[97] 



A PRAYER OF THIS AGE 

Thy Messenger of grace, 

Thy promised Spirit, Lord, 
Grant, to sustain, recall thy Face, 

And quicken all thy word ! 

Grant Him in this our age. 

To these our hearts, that we, 
Who look upon an ancient page. 

Its inward light may see. 

Grant Him to these our minds, 

That wrestle with the world. 
Until thy purpose in us finds 

A way to be unfurled. 

Grant to our wills, at last. 

That resurrection dawn 
When Thou Thyself, from the dead past, 

Shalt rise and lead us on! 



[98] 



EVENSONG 

Jesus, Good Shepherd, take us to thy fold! 
We are weary and the night is falling cold ; 
No rest we know but thine all-watchful care — 
Take us from the changing world to shelter 

there. 
Jesus, Good Shepherd, take us to thy fold! 

If we have strayed from thy blest paths to-day. 
If we have not hearkened to thy voice, we pray, 
Chasten us duly, give repentance meet, 
Only bring us back to rest around thy feet. 
Jesus, Good Shepherd, take us to thy fold! 

Thou who dost lay thy life down for the sheep, 
We would on thy bosom all confessing weep ; 
For when night closes round our way at last. 
Then we know that Thou alone canst fold us 

fast. 
Jesus, Good Shepherd, take us to thy fold! 



[99] 



"THAT THEY MAY BE ONE" 

Who names the name of Christ? 

Who prays, "Thy will be done"? 
Have neither hopes nor toils sufficed 

To weld their hearts in one? 

The passion of the Lord, 

How worketh it in us? 
How doth his quick and powerful word 

Rend his own body thus? 

The world of men, that drew 

Him on to Calvary, 
Why draws it us not thither, who 

Partake his ministry? 

All forms by which we came — 

Were they not crucified, 
If we his spirit caught, whose flame 

Consumed Him, that He died? — 

Believed that Spirit's power 

To work, in deathless youth, 
A new creation, in the hour 

That it is sought in truth? 

What form of words outworn. 

Of uses, in that day. 
Could stand between the world forlorn, 

And Christ, where He doth pray? 
[100] 



Spirit of God, awake 

In us ! Let this vain show 

Be done away, for Jesus' sake. 
And that the world may know 

The power of his love, 

His resurrection's power. 
To bring in one all men ; and prove 

His life each life's deep dower. 

Convict, constrain us, search, 

Till all be sacrificed. 
And in thy Spirit thy whole church 

Be born in one, O Christ! 



[101] 



IS GOD THE GOD OF THE WORLD? 

Is God the God of the world, 

Or only the God of a land? 
Have other lands other Gods? 

'Tis time we should understand 
Whether we made Him ourselves, 

Or He is the work of our hand ! 

Are we then children yet, 

Like the Children of Israel, 
To think the God of the world 

Is our God, and loves us well, 
But hates the rest of his sons 

And daughters, and makes them for Hell? 

Even when Christ has borne 

Our sorrows in guiltless shame? 

Even when we must plead 

The grace of his love-strong name? 

Even when love like his 

Has set our own hearts aflame? 



[102] 



PRAY YE THEREFORE 

O WHITE to the harvest is standing 
The field of the world in our day : 

The Lord of the grain is commanding 
His servants to pray. 

He would send us, but we are not ready ; 

Our hands are too weak for the task, 
Our purpose too faint, too unsteady, 

For all He would ask. 

He would lift up our eyes till they meet Him, 
Till his own eyes do light us, and show 

All He sees — till we fall and entreat Him 
To fit us to go ; 

Till we go in his strength, even weeping. 
For stress of the labor that grieves ; 

Till we come in the joy of the reaping 
Bearing with us our sheaves. 



[103] 



THE PRESENT CRISIS 

MY brothers, we have seen them, 

From the rising of the sun. 
Where the ages ran between them 

As eternal rivers run, 
Where they slept a sleep no clamor 

Of the nations yet could break — 
We have seen them shake the glamour 

From their eyelids, rouse and wake! 

We have seen them at the portal 

Flinging wide the crusted door, 
Bursting in an hour the mortal 

Roof-tree of the straitened yore, 
Looking for a living rootage 

Of the future, reaching hands 
Westward, crying, "Share the fruitage 

Of your years, O Christian Lands !" 

O my brothers, dare we palter, 

Grasp for gain, in such an hour? 
Mumble at our prayers, and falter. 

Holding back our utmost power? 
Speak of trade, and speak of science, 

Till our God by them is priced 
Worthy scorn and all defiance? 

Dare we give them less than Christ? 



[104] 



WHOSE SON IS HE? 

Lo, wc have heard his name, have seen his 

works, 
Have marveled at the gracious words that came 
Out of his mouth, have followed Him about 
Pondering all the things men say of Him — 
And now He asks, "Who say ye that I am?" 

Some say He is the carpenter: they know 
The house where He abides ; his brethren all 
Are with them in their native town; his name 
Has been a household word, since they re- 
member. 
He stood and talked with them, and with their 

children ; 
Walked through their streets, sometimes with 

dusty feet; 
Sat round their fires ; ate gladly at their board ; 
Wrought daily in their midst, as one of them. 
They are offended in Him. 

Others say 
He is a prophet: that his spirit caught 
The vision of seers and sages of all times 
And nations. Some declare He is as great 
As any, or as all the ancients. They 
Are ready with their lips to honor Him, 
But when they hear that calm command of his, 

[ 105 ] 



"Leave all thou hast, and come and follow Me," 
They heed it not. 

Lo, we must answer Him, 
For pausing in the solitary way 
Where He leads men apart, He turns on us 
A steadfast look, and asks us, "What say ye?" 

We know what Peter said, so long ago ; 

But how shall we, who stand on continents 

Undreamed by him, inhabiting centuries 

Miraculous beyond his boldest leap 

Of fancy when he stood and watched the wind 

Upturn the blue deep of Gennesaret — 

How shall we meet those deep eyes? How shall 

we 
Stop in this little by-path of the world 
And lose ourselves forever? 

Can we curb 
The mind that has encircled the round globe — 
Scanned it at large and closely, holding it 
A unit in the heavens — measuring 
The lands together with a span of steel. 
Riding the sea's wet pinions, netting all 
The nations with a fiery thread of thought. 
Coursing the crystal currents of the air. 
And soaring out into the infinite. 
Finding its resting place in sun and star? — 

[106] 



Not only taming nature's monstrous powers 
To be our ministers, but investing her 
With what she had not without us — a voice — 
The voice of truth — waking the silences 
Through all the universe to speak with us — 
Ever more plainly hearing, evermore 
Catching the music of some farther star? 
The mind, the will, that has encompassed this, 
And still finds hunger grow with knowledge, till 
It cries out for the Infinite sweep of space 
Wherein it may expand, and endless time — 
Shall it be bounded in a narrow strip 
Of Jewish sand, where Jordan and the sea 
And Dan and Beersheba shut out the world. 
And progress, science, history, and art? 
Shall it rest back on three mysterious years 
Once passed within that prison, and live o'er 
And o'er again their incidents, as though 
Time moved not, nor the wisdom of men grew? 

Long since our vision pierced beyond the fog 

Of superstition, to the light of law ; 

We see that reason rules the universe 

And we are not afraid. We learn to grasp 

The principles of reason for men's lives : 

How health and wealth and peace are best 

secured 
By knowledge, thrift, and virtue ; how the wars 
And tumults of the nations might be stilled 

[107] 



By simple justice; how truth and righteous- 
ness 
Alone are strong, or can at last prevail. 
The consummation of our knowledge, wrought 
Out into life, lies far ahead, indeed; 
But 'tis our goal. History heartens us ; 
The future calls us to it ; why stand we 
Gazing up into Heaven from Bethany 
For one two thousand years evanished hence? 

O vanity of human knowledge, thou 
That lost us Eden ! Thou dost lose us now 
The light of truth which million suns and stars 
But image faintly. So the Lord hath chosen 
The weak things, as thou seest, to confound 
The things thou callest mighty. They who 

found 
Nothing to boast of, all to wonder at, 
Wild Peter and the sons of Zebedee, 
Knowing so little, could believe all things. 
Because their eyes were pure and free to see. 
Where science stops to settle boundary lines, 
They felt the unbounded potency of love, 
That overflows all places, times, and forms. 
That overflows all speech, for that itself 
Is language to the living heart more clear. 
What is our knowledge but a weariness 
Of flesh and spirit, only as it yields 
More sight to something higher.? God is love! 

[108] 



And all the life that He creates is love, 
With thought to know the joy of loving; truth 
Itself is powerless till it throb to life 
In love, for love is truth that breathes and 
moves. 

And as we gaze into those eyes of his. 
That fisherman and publican could trust 
With their whole soul at the word "Follow Me," 
That spoke his love to the young ruler's heart, 
That wept above the city and at the tomb — 
Those eyes wherein the lowly Mary found 
A better part that could not pass away — 
Those eyes so often raised to Heaven in prayer 
And in thanksgiving — that so often held 
His enemies nonplussed with their pure light — 
Whose free, divine submission in the hour 
Of treachery made anned men fall back — 
Those eyes that looked on Peter, till he fled 
From sight of them to outer dark and cold 
And tears and bitter shame — they seem to bear 
A light too holy and ineffable 
For science to explain or space to hold. 
For art to image, or for thought to compass. 

And when we see Him with the multitude 
Where the diseased of flesh and mind and soul 
Crowded upon Him, hungry for the health 
They felt but in his presence, — see Him move 



[109] 



Among them, touching them with tenderness 
Of sympathy and power invincible, 
Speaking to each the word he needed most, 
Of comfort, or of courage, or rebuke; 
Then see Him, bending, break to them the bread 
Of life, his body, broken for their sakes — 
Pour out his soul as water for their thirst. 
Even unto death — we know Him present yet 
By our own need of Him, and pressing near 
We reach our longing hands to hold Him fast 
And find we can but grasp his garment's fringe. 

So truth breathed on us once — the truth in- 
deed; 
And still in him that hath not lifted up 
His soul to vanity, nor sworn deceit — 
Who has not said blasphemously, "Behold, 
I know the uttermost that can be known," 
Or "Nothing can be known of certainty," 
Who sees in knowledge but the handmaiden 
Of faith and hope and charity — within 
The living heart beats true to truth, and finds 
In Him the end of knowledge and the crown 
Of being. O diviner than our thought. 
We can but fall before Thee and adore, 
Owning in Thee the infinite, wherein 
The hunger of our souls immortally 
Can find no lack ! O height, O depth of love 
Past power of ours to fathom, that Thou dost 
stoop 

[110] 



To touch us with a human finger, break 

The still, cold vault of death for us, with hands 

Heavy with all the anguish of our sin ! 

Thou readiest those same scarred hands to our 

blind 
And stubborn doubt, and biddest us to be 
Not faithless, but believing, and behold. 
We find the power within us to obey ! 
The truth of Peter and of Thomas, yet, 
Is truth to each heart, and to all the race. 

Thought never yd could add a cubit's height 
To human stature. Life alone can grow. 
And herein lies the promise of that goal 
Which reason sees, but shall not reach alone : 
Love wakens love ; life in thy life expands 
Into thy likeness, wherein vital joy 
Flows out spontaneous duty, perfecting 
With natural freedom, reason's final truth. 

And so the little coasts of Palestine 
Could not contain Him, nor the cities old 
Of Greece and Italy, nor all the states 
Of rising Europe ; but his light made glad 
The dawning of the New World, and the Isles 
Made ready for his tidings, and the lands 
That sat in darkness and in death arise 
To greet Him at his coming. Even now 
We catch the Apocalyptic thrill of faith — 

[111] 



"The kingdoms of this world are all become 
The kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ." 

Nay, Nazarene, nor Galilean, now, 

Nor Son of Time art Thou ; the Living Truth ; 

The Light supreme that lighteth every man 

That comes into the world, if he will see ; 

God, and the Word of God, — God's Love de- 
clared ; 

Man, and the Way to God, — man's boundless 
hope; 

Behold, Thou art alive forevermore! 



[112] 



EASTER MEDITATION 



O GOD, they say, 

Who most survey 
The wondrous workings of thy mute creation 

That every day 

Ticks toward decay — 
The centuries run down to desolation. 

The blasted moon, 

Defunct so soon — 
A derelict upon the tides of nature — 

A mindless loon — 

Flits o'er our noon 
And mocks the waxing of our stronger stature. 

Great Mars, that rent 

The firmament 
And scattered living souls through fiery 
spaces — 

O mind intent, 

He soon is spent — 
His ocean sinks, his ditching interlaces ! 

Thy mysteries 
Of sounding seas, 
And all the music of thy cataract splashes, 

[113] 



And mists that rise 
In sunset skies, 
O Earth, dissolve in endless ether washes. 

Thy leafy towers 
And gay strewn flowerisj 
The snows that crown thy peaks of solid 
granite. 
Thy windy powers, 
Thy days and hours. 
Shall pass, and thou, a naked, sun-seared 
planet, 

Shalt fall again 

Into that fen 
Of dire corruption out of which thou earnest; 

To sons of men 

What matter, then. 
If thou dost honor them, or if thou blamest? 

The nations all 

That rise and fall, 
Extinct, forgotten, pass their puny races; 

Fair temple tall. 

Proud judgment hall, 
Disintegrate and perish from their places. 

And thou, my land, 
That now dost stand 
Midway between the pales of deathly darkness, 
[114] 



No project grand 
Thy genius manned 
Shall stem the infinite with ghostly starkness. 

Thy million tools, 

Thy giant pools 
Whereby thou pliest trade in such profusion, 

Thy senates, schools. 

Thy churches^ rules, 
Raised up in blood, sink back to dissolution. 

O Man, at last. 
Thy toil amassed. 
Of knowledge, art, renown, and golden treas- 
ure, — 
The storied past. 
The future vast, 
Fade out, both ways, in darkness without meas- 
ure. 

What thou hast done, 

What thou hast won. 
With pen or sword or plow or laboring ham- 
mer. 

It all shall run, 

Kissed by the sun. 
In sudden flame the brief course of its glamour. 



[115] 



II 



Earth, so fair, 

The lightest hair 
Thou barest on thy reeling head is numbered: 

For everywhere 

Thy locks do flare 
With waking of the immortal soul that slum- 
bered ! 

Thine ocean tons. 

Thy mountain thrones, 
Have lifted him to power of appliance ; 

Thy creeping ones, 

Thy circling suns. 
Have wrought in him the sacred truth of 
science. 

The little flower 

That blows this hour 
Opens to him a glimpse of joy and heaven; 

Its sunny dower 

Consumes, the power 
Works on in him, a purifying leaven. 

All beauty spread 

On wood or mead 
Makes beautiful his spirit that perceives it; 

All radiance shed. 

All rapture fled 
From sky and sea — his inmost soul receives it. 
[116] 



The sculptured dome 

Of Greece and Rome, 
O Modem World, so sunken now and hoary, 

Was once thy home 

And treasured tome 
Reveals thou yet hast not forgot its glory. 

All history 

Exists in thee ; 
Plato and Homer flourish in thy being; 

Philosophy 

And minstrelsy. 
They blossom yet from out their thought and 
seeing. 

O Country mine, 

These laws of thine, 
These very stones thou pilest here together — 

Each righteous line. 

Shall deathless shine. 
And weighty is the balance of a feather. 

Thou shapest here 

The princely peer. 
The citizen of the Celestial City 

To blazon clear 

The thousandth year. 
Thy truth, thy strength, thy justice, and thy 
pity. 

[117] 



Labor, that set 

His crown of sweat 
Upon the brow that was to have dominion — 

To do and get, 

To hold and let, 
To send and go at will on windy pinion — 

His treasures fail: 

Great wheel and sail 
At every turn reseek the changing ocean; 

But this avail 

Survives the gale — 
He freed himself who set the steel in motion. 

And thou, O Art, 

The spirit's mart, 
Thou boastest not thy passing flame of glory 

That better part. 

The human heart 
Thou wakenest to living song and story. 



Ill 



Unceasing whirled, 

This world on world 
Is mixed through all the universal ferment 

In ashes curled. 

Again unfurled. 
Reissuing from innermost interment. 



[118] 



Through all thy range, 

Immortal Change, 
Thou travailest to yield the living spirit ; 

Dost rearrange 

In symbols strange 
A higher birth of being to inherit. 



IV 



God, who hast wrought 

In earth this thought, 
In senseless suns and stars this deathless pas- 
sion — 

The same that sought. 

The same that taught 
Us utmost love, revealed in human fashion — 

Do Thou conduct ; 

Do Thou instruct 
Us how thy love doth labor through creation: 

While earth is sucked, 

How man is plucked 
From ruin on to honor and salvation. 

This inmost rage 

Of age on age. 
If Thou and nature with the soul not juggle. 

Is ours to wage — 

Our heritage. 
To learn, to love, to labor, and to struggle; 

[119] 



Pursuing still 

The perfect Will, 
The Love Divine, slain from the world's foun- 
dation ; 

Succumbing, till, 

With refluent thrill, 
Mutation rise again to revelation; 

And everything 

Bud forth and fling 
About our path a radiance supernal. 

And systems spring 

New born to sing. 
And man rejoice in life that is eternal; 

And fellowship 

Be strong and deep 
With Him who gives us life and love and 
beauty ; 

And men shall slip 

The hand and grip 
The Hand divine at every post of duty. 



Earth's narrow room 
Wliere we consume 
This life, is drenched with Heaven, past our 
perceiving ; 



[120] 



Her darkened tomb, 
The quickened womb 
Whence issues new the life of our believing. 

No more with fears 

We plod the years, 
Careful our feet shall find a narrow lodgment ; 

We look through tears. 

O'er blinding blears 
Millennial, and behold the day of judgment. 

O never, then, 

Fail heart or brain. 
In thought or prayer or uttermost endeavor: 

We wake again 

Diviner men. 
And tread the stars, with Him who died, for- 
ever ! 



[121] 



SONNETS 



"IN THE DAYS OF THY YOUTH" 

Now, while the flood of youth flows fair and 

free 
And the bright blossoms bend above its brink — 
While yet no broken reeds or dead leaves sink 
Upon its tide — now, now, dear Lord, of Thee, 
Whose hidden fountains feed the stream for 

me — 
Of Thee and of thy mercies would I think; 
And trusting fearless to the faithful link, 
The golden link of prayer, that I can see 

Forever shining through the sunlit air, 
With one end fastened to my slender bark 
And one lost high above my vision's scope, 
I need not dread the noonday's fiercer glare, 
Nor the sharp rocks below, nor the chill dark, 
But thank Thee, Lord, for life and love and 
hope! 



[125] 



II 

IN THE DELUGE 

O thou who sendest forth from out thy ark 
With glowing hand the silver pinioned dove 
Of thy youth's holy and believing love, 
To drive all day o'er widening waters dark 
'Neath lowering skies — no resting-place — no 

spark 
Of kindred life, how far so e'er she rove, 
Until at weary eve she backward move 
And fainting gain again her lonely bark! 

Doubt not ! God giveth sleep ! And after that 
Send forth thy dove unwavering; she shall 

bring 
Her olive leaf at last, and Ararat 
Shall yield her to the free, broad earth, to sing 
Through all the budding woods, new garlanded. 
With God's own rainbow arching o'er her head! 



[126] 



Ill 

THE CLOUD 

If I could pay a million for that cloud 
And call it mine, and mount its lap of gold, 
And wrap its glory 'round me, fold on fold. 
My soul should soar, and nevermore be cowed ! 
O vain presumption, fatuous as proud! — 
There should I breathe but thin and bitter cold. 
And floods of foggy blackness 'round me rolled 
Would swathe my senses in a deathly shroud ! 

But standing on the earth that bears and warms 
This fragile flesh and blood, and stretching out 
I\Iy empty hands, my short and feeble arms, 
j\Iy soul is freed by passionate desire — 
The cloud becomes my chariot of fire 
And bears me up to Heaven with a shout ! 



[127] 



IV 

AFTER DOUBT OF IMMORTALITY 

Yet, O my Mother, it cannot be so ! 
God does not give us love to mock our dust — 
Love, that is always great with hope and trust ; 
God will not let my love and thy love go 
Out into nothingness, nor count our woe 
Of long-enduring separation just 
The chasm which our generation must 
Leave for some nobler love to overflow. 

Thy love and mine were not destroyed by death, 

Nor yet by life and changing scenes of earth : 

My love remains for thee, so thine must be; 

My love and thine demand eternity. 

O why in some diviner, freer place. 

May not our love grow perfect, with the race.'* 



[128] 



ON LOSING FAITH IN GOD 

O death unspeakable! The universe 
Is but a funeral pile of gilded stones 
Where lie interred the Eternal Dead One's 

bones. 
Henceforth infinity doth but immerse 
All being in death; life is a painted hearse, 
A whited sepulchre, wherein Avho groans 
A little moment, swift dissolving moans. 
Whelmed in the doom of that all-blighting 



Henceforth eternity doth but iterate 

Cycles of death. Far evolutions mock 

At earth ; earth mocks at evolutions ; shock 

Of rising system or of falling state 

Are one : all birth is death ; all souls dilate 

In chaos, reaching after death, their fate! 



[129] 



VI 



ON DOUBTING THE DIVINITY 
OF CHRIST 

In the still upper chamber of my heart 

Stand the eleven with bewilderment 

Of sorrow, shame, despair, love, wonder, blent 

Upon their faces. Lingering apart 

From the blood-guilty nation's noisy mart, 

They brood on all they late believed and meant 

And question if in reason or intent 

They were mistaken in the chosen part. 

The doubt of Thomas and the love of John 
Strive with the truth and guilt of Jona's son. 
Faint hope of some, and grief of everyone. 
But Judas is not there. Saviour, view 
That secret, bolted chamber, through and 

through, — 
Stand in the midst and say, "Peace be to you !" 



[130] 



VII 

THE SERMON 

I hold no word of what I heard that night, 
But past the power within me to unroll, 
My eyes beheld a vision of a soul 
Who walked with God by faith, and found it 

sight, 
Whose steps were free and certain in that light, 
Whom fear and agony could not control. 
Who saw through storm and tumult still the 

goal 
Of peace his inward peace commanded. Height 

Nor depth nor length nor breadth could ere 

divide 
Him from the truth he trusted, for he saw 
Through all the world the working of that law 
Whereby himself had triumphed; over all 
And in all and through all he heard the call 
Of love, that must at last be satisfied. 



[131] 



VIII 

THE BLIND MAN 

I know not how my tongue can speak aright 
Of Who it was that found me by the way 
Begging for bread, and pausing stooped to lay 
His hands upon my lids, that longed for light, 
And bade me wash — that I received my sight. 
And the place where He met me, and the clay 
He used upon me, and the water's spray. 
Grew conscious with the presence of his might. 

But this I know, that whereas I was blind. 
Behold, I see, and I walk without fear. 
And where I faltered once, the way is clear. 
And all is broad that was of old confined, 
And life is loosened in me, and I burn 
With joy of my new sense, where'er I turn. 



[132] 



IX 

ATONEMENT 

I seem to see, O Christ, how Thou didst bear 
My sin tind all the world's upon the tree, 
How all the blight of our iniquity 
Came down on thy pure spirit, bowing there, 
As thou didst utter that divinest prayer 
Earth ever heard: for life was love to Thee 
And love takes on itself the power to be. 
In weal and woe, the creature of its care. 

Thine infinite sympathy embraced, that hour 
The race of men, past, present, and to be. 
And more than thorns or nails or soldier's 

sword, 
The anguish of their guilt's undoing power 
Wrung from thy soul that agonizing word, 
"My Father, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" 



[133] 



X 

INEVITABLE 

Thou Christ of God,, how couldst Thou enter in 
To this world, but to die? The Prince there- 
of— 
Hadst Thou but bent the knee to him, that 

strove 
For thy submission — his son Thou mightst 

have been, 
And reigned, and having seen thine armies win, 
Died honored; choosing only that bright Dove 
That called Thee Son of God — being all 

love — 
Thou couldst but die, in such a world of sin ! 

Thou couldst but die — aye, and Thou couldst 

but rise — 
As sure as clay is clay, and God is God I 
Earth could not hold Thee, nor the senseless 

clod 
Wherein the hardened hearts of men are cast — 
Thou risest through our hearts — aye, Thou 

dost rise 
Through earth and Heaven, Immortal King, at 

last! 



[134] 



XI 

THE PIVOT OF THE WORLD 

I dreamed 'twixt sleep and wake : the world was 
one 

Vast tumorous welter of black cloud, that 
heaved 

In the deep gloom wherein it was conceived. 

j\Iy soul was whelmed therein and nigh undone. 

Then 'gan faint streaks of gray to loom and 
run 

And filter through the dark, until they weaved 

A web of twilight, wherein I perceived 

The clouds move round me toward some dawn- 
ing sun. 

Then broke the gloom in rifts, even to the heart 
Of the world, and I beheld where the deep 

night 
Gathered and fled away from utter light 
About the uplifted cross ; past the cross lay 
The undreamed of glory, and all this cloudy 

part 
Slow turned upon it into all that day. 



[ 13."' ] 



XII 

BEREAVEMENT 

We are born deaf and blind: the world is 

round 
Us, tabernacling all that is with clay, 
When first we break into its mimic day; 
For so God shuts our childhood in, to sound 
Innumerous changing forms, till we have found 
Some secret of his Presence — till we say, 
"The world is shadow, and shall fade away, 
At the end of time in some more vast pro- 
found."— 

Say, but not comprehend, — till pangs of death 
Strike through our flesh and blood, and at a 

breath 
Life of our life slips from our palsied ken 
To realms unsearchable by our senses, — then 
Is the world rent asunder as a scroll. 
And God's eternity bursts on the soul! 



[136] 



XIII 

"WHOSE LOVES IN HIGHER LOVE 
ENDURE" 

Nay, kneel not to me, Love, for I and Thou 
Are not the deities we dream today — 
Lest time should have us in derision ; nay, 
I stand no more if thou love-blinded bow, 
Lest so I blot the worlds, and disallow 
Unfathomed star-beams, darkening all thy 

way; 
Or else, at last, the universal ray 
Ungild before thee my poor crescent brow. 

But I will kneel with thee to God above. 

Of whom are all things ; in whose love is light 

Illimitable ; who giveth freely sight 

To lifted eyes ; who causeth us to shine 

With image of his glory, and our love 

To mount forever through the deep divine! 



[137] 



XIV 

CUPID AND CHRIST 

Blind guides there be that do afflict us still 
And they have taken the blind heathen boy 
And set him far above all Christian joy, 
And bowed themselves to him, to have his will 
In them, and bade our children drink their 

mi 

Of his untamed desire, who makes a toy 
Of hearts and sets up houses to destroy. 
That he may laugh when comes on them all ill. 

Love's not our end, else were the generations 
A treadmill and no more; nor perfected 
Is man in woman nor woman in man, but Head 
Of both is Christ, and built in Him shall stand 
Their home inviolate, the whole creation's 
Glory — without Him crumble on the sand. 



[138] 



XV 

O BARREN EARTH! 

O barren Earth, that wilt not yield thyself 
Unto the brooding Heaven, that with cost 
Unspeakable hath sought thee from the host 
Of virgin worlds, desiring in thy delf 
Of clay to form the image of itself — 
Thou, who dost dare deny the Holy Ghost ! 
Shut in thyself thou diest, and art lost. 
Girdled with all thy glory and thy pelf! 

O shrink no more the travail and the might, 
But know the joy thereof! Thou who hast 

said 
"I will be free," confess thy being's Lord 
In whom alone thyself is perfected; 
Yea, bid the Bridegroom enter to his right. 
And endless life flow forth from deep accord! 



[139] 



XVI 

SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

Jesus, ere yet thy star of old had shone 

In the East, the rabble hither, thither, turned 

Crying, "Lo here! Lo there!" Pure spirits 

yearned 
Continual in the temple, sensient grown 
To gleams of heavenly glory; longing, lone. 
Wise hearts afar the thrilling time discerned; 
God's power on Mary's innocency burned; 
And Herod trembled: so wert Thou fore- 
known ! 

Even so this whole, earth-giddy, later earth, 

Still turning on itself, hath almost run 

Another circle of its center sun; 

Lo here, lo there, they cry, "A heavenly star!" 

The watchers catch a glimmering afar. 

And pure hearts travail for thy modern birth I 



[140] 



XVII 
OUR STAR 

Star of the East, that issuedst toward the 

West, 
Rising from age to age with light more grand 
On new born nations, on each virgin strand — 
Still drawing forth the wisest and the best 
From out the failing past, till Thou didst 

rest 
In these last days above my native land! 
Star of the East, whereby we hope to stand 
Till through us all the race of men is blest ! 

Unfold thy heart ! And O, with all our heart, 
May we acknowledge Thee, that we no more 
Go hence, nor perish from our place, but here 
Be brought forth new from age to age in fear 
And love of thy great light, and on this shore 
Thy heavenly glory work its saving part ! 



[141] 



XVIII 

AMERICA AND THE HAGUE 

O my dear Country, thou canst never dare 
Deny the Court of Peace! Thou, who art 

hope 
Of the world's weary nations ; 'neath the slope 
Of whose spread wings they seek a sheltering 

care 
Like to the care of God! Thou, who must 

share 
Christ's saving travail for their sons who grope 
Through toil to thee ; must in thy members cope 
With all their war, in strength of naught but 

prayer ! 

Nay, but thou must be first to own that Court 

And set it as a crown upon the brow 

Of Christ, the King of nations. First must 

thou 
Confess his heavenly rule thy last resort, 
Even as it is: so shall He judge thy cause 
And 'stablish it in his unfailing laws. 



[14^] 



XIX 

THE WORLD'S STAR 

Star of the East, that travelledst towards the 

west, 
Bringing a new creation from the night 
Of heathen darkness to thy marvelous light, 
That shincst now upon the foremost crest 
Of this our human tide, that quickenest 
Remotest shores with currents of thy might, 
Till they who saw not, with desire of sight 
Turn all ways through the world in eager 

quest ! 

Complete thy course and shine upon the East, 

Till every race and every tongue be bound 

In the gold circle of thy perfect round; 

Till pestilence and war from earth have ceased 

And every nation find its final good, 

Its highest self, in thy high brotherhood! 



[143] 



DEC 12 1913 



